"Encounter with Beuys" - 1984 - by Joseph Beuys - Vitrine containing Incontro con Beuys, 1974, felt, copper, fat, and cord ( Mark Rosenthal, Joseph Beuys, Actions, Vitrines, Environments, 2005, The Menil Collection, Houston & Tate Modern). "Beuys vitrine sculptures exemplify a literally pursuit, for they are created in private moments. The vitrine soliloquy manifests itself in the placement of the detritus of his studio, including leftover materials from his actions, into poetic ensembles within glass cases.......With a vitrine one dwells in a world of diminutive things, lovingly displayed and carefully composed. The viewer is encouraged to pose questions about the origin of each object, how each relates to the other and what might transpire by their continued proximity." (M. Rosenthal, Staging Sculpture, Joseph Beuys, pages: 57 & 63, 2005).
In this composition Beuys invites us to question the objects...in specific I am interested in the tied strips of fat...what is the significance of wrapping it with cord? Do we wrap and tie objects to contain them, to hold them together?
Why is this a reocurring strategy in many artists work? and ultimately why am I tying, holding together my round paper objects/drawings? Is the reason different for each individual artist? or are there universal reasons?
3 comments:
dear marcella,
Cristo and Jean Claude does some wrapping in their work. Mostly of large environments, but at the beginning of their carrier also wrapping minor things...
http://www.christojeanneclaude.net/early.html
hmm, what else was i thinking about, oh yes, the work of Diller and Scofido. they are architects but they also do smaller work. in the project 'bad press: dissident ironing' they ironed men's shirts, but wrongly
http://www.prototypo.com/Essays/Essays3/003_1.htm
http://www.arcspace.com/architects/DillerScofidio/aberrant_architectures/
goodest of luck
it also reminds me of packing presents, i look at your work and i wonder what is inside.
Aagot; Many thanks for reminding me of Christo and Jean Claude. They have done very few wrappings in comparison to their whole portfolio of art works. It is easier for the public to view their work as "wrapping" but the work is more about altering the environment...then wrapping is one way to do that. Wrapping for them is altering the environment.
Aaron Betsky says of the work of Diller & Scofidio: "They reconstruct the rituals of buying and selling, of control and negotiation, that makes of a world that may be our daily reality, but that usually goes unnoticed."
So the words: "a ritual of buying and selling" have caught my attention...Perhaps wrapping is part of one of this rituals - or buying and selling of controlling and negotiating...of attracting and controlling.
And as you rightly say...packaging, wrapping presents, attracting the viewer who is wondering what is inside...and probably controlling his/her attention.
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